Cats Recognise When Speech Is Directed at Them

A new study led by the University of Paris Nanterre has found that cats change their behaviour when they hear their owner's voice in a tone directed at them, but not when they hear the voice of a stranger addressing them, or the voice of their owner directed at another person.

These findings suggest that cats are capable of forming strong affective bonds with their owners.

Scientists have long known that human vocal tone changes depending on who it is directed at — for example when speaking with infants or pets, as opposed to other adults. While earlier studies showed that the tone of human speech changes when directed at cats, little was previously known about how cats respond to this.

The researchers examined how 16 cats responded to pre-recorded voices of their owners and of strangers speaking sentences in a tone directed at the cat and in a tone directed at an adult. The scientists investigated three conditions: in the first condition, the speaker's voice shifted from that of a stranger to that of the cat's owner, while in the second and third conditions, the tone of the cat's owner or the stranger respectively shifted from cat-directed to adult-directed speech.

In the first condition, ten out of 16 cats showed a decrease in behavioural intensity while listening to three audio recordings of a stranger's voice calling them by name. However, when they heard the voice of their owner, their behavioural intensity increased markedly again, and the cats displayed behaviours such as turning their ears towards the speakers, moving around the room, and dilating their pupils. According to the experts, this change in behaviour demonstrates that cats are able to distinguish their owner's voice from that of a stranger.

In the second experimental condition, ten cats reduced their behavioral intensity when hearing audio recordings of their owner in an adult-directed tone, but significantly increased it when hearing their owner speak in a cat-directed tone. No such change in behavioral intensity was observed in the third condition, when a stranger spoke in either an adult-directed or a cat-directed tone. The cats thus appeared to be able to distinguish whether their owner was speaking in a cat-directed or adult-directed tone, but did not respond differently when a stranger's voice changed its tone.

However, further research is needed to determine whether these findings also apply to more socialized cats that are accustomed to interacting with strangers.

«These findings add a new dimension to the study of the human-cat relationship, as they imply the development of a special form of communication in human-cat dyads based on experience. Our results underscore the importance of one-to-one relationships for cats and support the recent literature on the ability of cats and humans to form strong bonds«, the authors conclude.